Denise Paraná

Denise Paraná is a Brazilian journalist and writer, born in São Paulo. Her doctoral thesis, written in 1995 at the Universidade de São Paulo, generated the authorised biography of Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva , released under the name of Lula, Son of Brazil, a book that was made ​​into a movie of the same name.

This work was inspired by Gustav Klimt (1862-1918), founder of the Vienna Secession, who is known for his highly stylised and sumptuously decorated portraits and female nudes. The artist has written: “The painting is a reflection on the feminine figure in these last ninety years, almost a century. Is woman still a mere passive being before life? Are we ornaments, decoration, or subject of our own word? … Women stopped being objects of desire to become desiring creatures.”